ZAP // Erich Ferdinand / Flickr
Homo neanderthalensis, Neanderthal Man
New research theorizes that Neanderthals did not become extinct and instead genetically merged with homo sapiens.
A new study challenges the long-held belief that Neanderthals disappeared completely about 40,000 years ago, proposing instead that they were gradually absorbed by the growing population of Homo sapiens through extensive interbreeding.
Researchers from the University of Rome Tor Vergata, the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology and the University of L’Aquila have developed a mathematical model that suggests that the disappearance of Neanderthals was Less of an extinction and more of a genetic fusion. The findings, published in the journal Scientific Reports, propose that, within a period of 10,000 to 30,000 years of contact, Neanderthals were almost completely absorbed into the human genetic heritage.
Principal investigator Andrea Amadei and her colleagues describe their model as simple but “robust” to explain the observed decline of Neanderthals. Using data on the birth rates of modern hunter-gatherers, they estimated how small groups of Neanderthals could have been gradually absorbed by a much larger and more reproductively prolific Homo sapiens population, says .
The study assumes that Neanderthal genes did not confer any specific survival advantage, but the model also foresees its eventual genetic assimilation. If advantageous Neanderthal characteristics were considered, such as those linked to immunity or adaptation to the cold, the authors suggest that the assimilation hypothesis would be even stronger.
The new model is in line with recent archaeological evidence indicating that the decline of Neanderthals in Europe it was gradual, not abrupt. Modern genetic studies now show that people of non-African descent retain about 1% to 4% Neanderthal DNA, a testament to this long and complex history of interbreeding.
Homo sapiens probably began migrating from Africa long before than previously thought, arriving in migratory waves that arrived in Europe possibly more than 200 thousand years ago. Each influx of early humans may have further integrated Neanderthal communities into the growing population, “like sand washed into the sea,” the authors write.
In addition to genetics, researchers emphasize that Neanderthals were far from being primitive. They made tools, produced art, controlled fire, and probably possessed sophisticated communication capabilities. Therefore, its disappearance was not due to inferioritybut to the inexorable mixing of two closely related populations.
